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Baby owls, contrary to popular speculation, aren't cute at all when they're hungry. They don't just open their beaks and chirp politely. When they're starving, they hiss and screech like they crawled straight out of hell, and they absolutely do not stop until that void in their stomachs becomes everyone's problem. They fight for their food.
The Talon knew this perfectly well.
No, no. Bruce had told him not to call himself that at least a hundred times. Dick was a human. An individual. Not a Talon, just an avian hybrid—just like Bruce was a giant bat hybrid. But hey, that was definitely not the main issue right now.
That wasn't the reason his ADHD had grabbed the flags and taken off on a relentless marathon inside his mind, either.
The real reason was the tiny silhouette standing right in front of him, trying to jack up a million-dollar, massive car using a wet brick bigger than his own height just to steal the tires.
Dick let out a gentle trill from deep in his throat, exactly like an overly curious mother bird. This specific frequency was an "I'm right here" reassurance, a "hey kiddo, what're you doing?" bewilderment, and a "that thing is heavy, you're gonna hurt yourself" warning all compressed into a single note.
Dick winced at his own inner monologue. He knew exactly how shitty it sounded when he tried to explain it with long human words. But that's just how these instinctual avian sounds worked; unlike words, they could never be confined to a single, shallow meaning.
The tiny baby bird across from him froze the millisecond he heard the sound. He snapped his head up, instantly puffing up invisible feathers like a shield, squared his tiny shoulders, and started scanning the dark corner where the sound came from with feral, hyper-alert eyes.
The moment the little bird saw the massive, well-fed avian hybrid stepping out of the shadows, he let out a terrified screech and landed right on his ass. But he scrambled back to his feet in a matter of seconds.
Right after that, he started doing the infamous "Scary Monster" routine. God... Dick was literally going to melt at the absolute cuteness of it. In moments of danger, little chicks would hiss and expand to make themselves look like a giant bird. This baby was puffing out his feathers to the absolute max to look three or four times bigger than he actually was. But his feathers were so unkempt, patchy, and—to put it politely—sickly, that the move wasn't working at all. He didn't look any more dangerous than an angry teddy bear stuffed with too much cotton.
Dick tilted his head in delight, his eyes crinkling with pure fondness, barely restraining himself from chirping in joy. His hindbrain was screaming at him: Preen those feathers, snatch the chick, and take him to the nest immediately! He took a deep breath to silence that feral, overprotective instinct. To rein himself in and give the fledgling some space, he slowly dropped to one knee. He held his palms open and facing up to show he was unarmed and harmless.
The fledgling, however, had spread his invisible wings wide toward the ground and leaned forward. He was mimicking a flawless attack posture, but the sight only triggered screaming 'protect, protect the chick' signals in Dick's nervous system. Maybe there was something seriously wrong with Dick's acetylcholine receptors, who knew? A gentle, soothing 'coo' spilled from his throat.
Ah, here they go. Now the fledgling was beak-clicking. He was clacking his beak together at a breakneck pace, creating a harsh, mechanical clack-clack-clack sound, acting like a tiny machine gun. Dick knew perfectly well that this sound was meant to psychologically stress the enemy. Every Talon was specifically trained to make that sound, and if a Talon was making it in the shadows, it was the last dirge you'd ever hear. It was a death song.
Except, the tiny chick in front of him had absolutely nothing to do with singing a death song. From the outside, he just looked like an angry cartoon character with his jaw shivering from the cold. He was about as dangerous as an overly pissed-off Donald Duck.
"Hey, hey little chick... Whatcha doin' over there?"
Dick mentally cursed himself. Did he seriously just sound like a talking animal straight out of a fable book?
The puffed-up chick in front of him, however, had zero time for fables. Unexpectedly, a venomous hiss ripped from that reedy, cracked voice, dripping with the darkest streets of Gotham:
"Fuck off."
Dick placed a hand over his heart in mock horror. "Gasp... Chicks shouldn't use such foul language."
"I ain't got no food!" the baby bird yelled. The feral hostility in his voice wasn't enough to mask the sheer desperation and hunger underneath. His chest heaving rapidly, he pointed a dirt-smudged hand at the massive vehicle behind him. "And I found this ride first! Some rich prick's car. Go find yer own prick, I ain't sharin'!"
When the tiny chick reached again for the wet brick—heavier than he was—wedged under the car's massive tire, his shoulders shook violently. Hypoglycemia and the freezing cold had driven him to the verge of shivering like a leaf, but he stubbornly refused to give up.
Panicking at the very real possibility of those tiny hands getting crushed under the massive brick, Dick instantly took a step forward. "Whoa, whoa! You're just a baby, you shouldn't touch that, you're gonna crush your fingers!"
"I ain't a baby!" the fledgling snarled, forced to drop the brick and immediately raising the rusty crowbar like a shield across his chest. "Jesus, what the hell is your problem, you freak?!"
Dick tilted his head slightly, an uncontrollably, undeniably fond, stupid grin spreading across his lips. "My problem is you, little... little chick."
When the shadow of a massive, pitch-black silhouette fell over them, the tiny chick's body went completely rigid. Though there was really no need for him to be this terrified; it was just Bruce. Just Bruce... Meaning, Batman.
Without dropping that fond grin, Dick turned his head slightly. "There he is," he said cheerfully. "The rich prick who owns the car."
When the little chick swung his rusty crowbar forward in terror, the exact chemical reaction Dick had been expecting took place: The old bat—the only flying mammal—had his 'parental care' instincts instantly triggered. The smirk on Dick's lips widened. Oh yeah... The tiny chick was theirs now. Bruce was absolutely going to kidnap this kid. The Talon inside him agreed with a feral purr: A small, frail fledgling kicked out of the nest would die alone on the streets.
Protecting him was the large bird's duty.
The Bat swept his white, expressionless lenses over the duo before locking his gaze directly onto the fledgling. Faced with that terrifying caped silhouette, the fledgling took a step back, waving the crowbar helplessly in the air as his voice trembled.
"We can work somethin' out!" he yelled, his voice cracking with panic. "I... I ain't even took the rims off yet! And I... Dammit!" The tiny chick's eyes had welled up with tears; that fragile wall beneath his hostility was right on the verge of collapsing.
Dick immediately lunged forward, wedging himself between the fledgling and the massive bat like a meat shield. While the baby bird stared in shock at the large avian hybrid who had just called him a 'chick', a guttural, inhuman sound tore from Dick's throat:
"You're scaring him. You're scaring the fledgling."
That wasn't Dick Grayson speaking; it was the pure, predatory voice of a Talon protecting its nest, delivering a clear 'back off' warning to Batman.
Faced with this sudden reaction, Bruce subtly drew his cape back, giving the duo space. With his thick, gravelly voice, he muttered calmly, as if staking his own instinctual claim: "That fledgling and you are strictly mine pup " Still, respecting the feral boundary the Talon had just laid down, he slowly took a step back.
Meanwhile, Dick gently pried the stiffened fingers of the shell-shocked fledgling open, taking the heavy crowbar out of his hands. He leaned down and slowly rubbed his jaw against the crown of the baby's head—a pure scent-marking, a claiming ritual. Though the chick stiffened at the sudden affection, he involuntarily leaned into the warmth. Fighting hard not to completely melt into the touch, he forced himself to take a step back, a curious, involuntary click escaping his throat.
"You're my fledgling now," Dick whispered. "You don't need to be afraid."
The fledgling absolutely, positively did not accept this claim. Yet Dick kept up his gentle, rhythmic chirping. With his arms spread wide, he was calling the baby into a safe nest. The tiny kid tried to cover his ears with his grimy hands, fighting not to surrender to the sweet nest-call that was starting to hijack his mind.
"Hey, hey... it's okay, little one," Dick said in a soothing tone. "You're freezing and you're hungry, right? Come here, tiny chick."
The fledgling shook his shoulders stubbornly. "I ain't... ain't a chick."
"Aw, come here, little... little, tiny wing."
The fledgling was fighting a battle to the death with his own wild nature. He was dying to seek refuge with the large bird, to answer that warm nest-call, but the ruthless survival skills he'd learned in Crime Alley were violently suppressing this weak submission from his mid and hindbrain.
Bruce, having retreated to a corner, watched the duo from the shadows while already sending a covert message from his gauntlet computer to Alfred to "put some cookies in the oven." He had completely outsourced the job of pacifying the fledgling to his son. Because even if Dick used to be a brainwashed, ruthless Talon, he was still leagues better at emotional communication than Batman (Yeah, the big bat was literally that bad at it).
Dick let out another series of rhythmic, inviting clicks. As if hypnotized, the fledgling slowly tilted his head to the side, blinking his dirty eyelashes in rapid succession. Dick matched the angle, tilting his own head in return with immense glee.
"Is the fledgling gonna come here, hmm?" he cooed softly. "Chicks need to be taken care of, loved, fed... Is my fledgling gonna come here, my little wing?"
Within the shadows, Dick's eyes lit up with that golden, mesmerizing glow unique to a Talon. Right at that moment, an embarrassingly loud, massive rumble erupted from the chick's stomach. As their gazes locked, all those feral instincts hanging in the air caught each other in a flawless dance and aligned. The tiny bird took a highly cautious lap around the large bird, who still had his arms spread wide, while Dick relentlessly continued to make those soothing nest sounds.
And finally, that street-forged wall completely shattered.
The fledgling broke into a trot with his tiny steps and threw himself directly into Dick's chest. Burying his grime-covered face tightly into the crook of the man's neck, he nuzzled in like a cat, completely surrendering to the nest. As Dick wrapped his arms tightly around that tiny body, his voice was filled with pure triumph:
"Welcome to the nest, Little Wing."
Meanwhile, the massive, terrifying Batman in the shadows turned around with a rare, incredibly warm smile on his face.
"Let's go," he said in a soft voice. "Alfred is waiting for us."